With ultrasound, seeing is believing

Connie Taylor, director of the Ray County Women’s Resource Center, received the Culture of Life Service Award Monday from the Knights of Columbus for her work in preventing abortions. Taylor is pictured, from left, with Mike Farnan, Dr. David Smith, D.O., David Daniels and Chris Bradfield. Farnan and Daniel are members of the local Knights council. Bradfield is the organization’s district deputy for the area. (Photo by David Knopf/Richmond News)

By David Knopf/Richmond News

Fourteen people crowded into a small room to share space with a $33,000 machine organizers believe will convince more women not to terminate pregnancies with abortions.

The ultrasound machine at Ray County Women’s Resource Center and more than 30 like it at similar centers in Missouri is seen as a sophisticated tool to encourage more women to bring pregnancies to term, organizers Connie Taylor and Chris Bradfield say.

The idea, they say, is that once a woman sees an image of her child she will be less inclined to seek an abortion.

“Nine out of 10 women will not proceed with an abortion if there’s an ultrasound,” said Bradfield, district deputy for the Knights of Columbus, an organization that organized fundraising for the new Richmond ultrasound machine.

The percentage of women deciding not to terminate a pregnancy increases “when the husband or boyfriend is there” to see the ultrasound image, Bradfield said.

Bradfield didn’t cite the source of his statistic, but it is generally agreed more women who see ultrasound images chose not to pursue abortion as an option.

“That is why this is so much better than standing around on the corner with signs,” he said of the trend to employing ultrasounds to counter Planned Parenthood and other women’s clinics that provide abortions.